


Shrapnel

by theladyhathaway



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Canon Compliant, Eren protects Levi, Fluff, M/M, Platonic Male/Male Relationships, canonverse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-12
Updated: 2016-01-12
Packaged: 2018-05-13 09:37:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,591
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5702959
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theladyhathaway/pseuds/theladyhathaway
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>a thing goes boom and eren's hero complex gets him in trouble again feat. the return of previously written nurse levi.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shrapnel

**Author's Note:**

> damn it's been forever since i updated, sorry. i love writing these two in platonic situations that could eventually lead to a romantic relationship. canonverse mutual trust, respect, and affection between eren and levi, fuck yeah! unbeta'd and barely edited, as usual.

_Images and sensations run through his mind like a stream of water down a hill. An ominous shaking and a high shriek, rapidly rising in pitch, behind him… He turns, a second of silence and a cry of “Captain!” then something heavy crashing into him from behind and knocking him down, his head cracking painfully against the ground, a flash of light and a huge explosion, a high ringing sound in his ears, then silent blackness reaches out and swallows him..._

Levi wakes with a start. What…? He’s aware of a soft mattress beneath him first, then a howling pain in the back of his head demands his immediate attention. Gods above, what the hell? He cracks his eyes open slowly, ignoring the spike of pain through his skull this action brings, blinking grit and sleep from them with a grimace. Glancing around, he realizes he’s in his quarters back at base. A single candle is lit on the nightstand, and the blackness of the windows tells him it’s likely the middle of the night.

That’s right, they’d been on a mock expedition… Some plan Erwin and Hanji had come up with, something about portable cannons as an extra line of defense… A cannon… had exploded? He remembered standing near them, watching his squad work to take down false Titans, remembered turning to look for the source of the sudden high shriek behind him. He realizes that was likely the sound of the metal cannon tearing itself apart before it exploded. Something had knocked him down, landed on top of him, protected him from the blast… What had that been?

He sits up slowly, finding himself sore everywhere, and swings his legs over the edge of the bed to stand. He scowls at his filthy state, and begins stripping off his mostly-intact 3DMG and his clothes, before ducking into the bathroom to give himself a once over with a washcloth and a bar of soap. Once he’s regained some semblance of his old self, he ducks back out to dress again. The pain in his head has turned to a constant dull throb. Persistent, but not crippling. He runs a hand backward over his head and, finding a knot the size of a goose egg beneath his hair, cringes as his fingers skim the swollen and sensitive skin.

Levi hears quiet voices coming from the cracked door, and when he steps out into the hallway he recognizes Hanji’s high trill and Erwin’s bass rumble in a low exchange, coming from the door at the end of the hallway to his right, light spilling out from around the half-closed door. The infirmary. Levi’s heart stops in his chest for a split second, then starts back up in double time. He starts towards the door with a quick, quiet step, his mind working furiously, pain forgotten. Hanji and Erwin in the infirmary. Had one of them been hurt? Or someone else? They both _sounded_ fine. Had it been one of Levi’s squad, his endearing and motley crew of bickering teenagers?  

He pauses, then pushes the door open, oiled hinges swinging silently. Lit candles fill the surprisingly warm room, and Hanji and Erwin lean over one of the occupied beds, talking quietly, blocking Levi’s view of its occupant. Medical tools flash silver in the light against Hanji’s bloodied hands.  His heart sinks. It must be bad, for Hanji and Erwin to both be here. Dread sinks its claws into his gut. Levi draws up behind them, and Erwin turns with a dry, tired smile, to greet him. Levi grunts in response, then looks over his shoulder.

_Eren_. It’s Eren in the bed. He lies on his stomach, eyes closed and face pale, his back covered in a sheen of rich dark blood, dozens of tiny incisions littering his tanned skin. Levi feels himself relax marginally even as ice fills his veins. At least the boy was alive, despite this horrific injury. It was definitely true that Eren Jaeger was proving difficult to kill. He could see the slow movements of his lungs filling and emptying at a measured and even pace. Hanji straightens with a huff to give Levi a once over with a practical eye, goggles pushed up onto their forehead. “Oh good, you’re awake. I’m glad you’re here, maybe now the Commander here can go get some shut-eye. He’s been sitting up all night." 

Erwin demurs, and Hanji brings one of the bloodied tools up to point at his nose, squinting at him, brows furrowed. “Don’t give me that, it’s been a long day. Don’t pretend you’re not exhausted too.” Erwin meets their gaze for a long moment, then seems to realize this isn't an argument he'll win. Hanji does have a point, Smith looks pretty bad. He sighs through his nose, then lifts his crystalline eyes to Levi’s, raising an eyebrow. Levi nods silently and Erwin rises, then leaves as quietly as Levi arrived. Hanji turns the tool on Levi.

“You. Sit. You look ready to fall over anyway. See that rag by his head? It’s got chloroform on it, and you need to press it over Eren’s mouth and nose so he stays out while I keep working on his back. He said he didn’t mind being awake for this, but I insisted. The regeneration process seems to work faster when he’s awake, I think.” They broke off for a moment, lost in thought about the mysteries of Titan shifter physique. Then they shook their head briefly and jerked their chin towards the rag. “Go ahead and give him another dose. Hold it over his face for a count of five," they order. Levi complies and sits quietly, watching Hanji's deft hands work. 

Returning their attention to Eren’s ruined flesh, they bring the scalpel up, and slice through one of the half healed little incisions, then grabbed a rag to wipe at the upwelling of fresh blood. While mopping the blood with one hand, Hanji inserts a pair of delicate tweezers into the tiny wound. When they emerge seconds later, a tiny, razor-sharp, piece of black metal is pincered between them. They drop the metal with a soft _plink_ onto a small tray, already covered in bloody pieces of metal, some horrifyingly large to imagine embedded in flesh. Levi inhales heavily through his nose. The picture of what happened when the cannon exploded, what knocked him down and protected him, is becoming very clear.

As if Levi had spoken his thoughts out loud, Hanji, still bent over Eren’s back and having moved on to another entrance wound, murmured, “You know how this happened, right?”

Levi nods, his eyes fixed on Eren’s face, and makes an affirming noise. Hanji sighs and sits back, watching Eren’s skin slowly knit itself back together, steaming as it does. That explained the room’s temperature. Eren was running even hotter than usual as his body put itself back together.

When Hanji leans back over their work again, they start babbling, and their tone is off-handed, casual, as if they were discussing the weather, “Y’know, it’s strange. Only the wounds I’ve pulled metal out of are closing. The wounds I haven’t gotten to yet are staying partially open, almost as if his body knows there’s something there that shouldn’t be. He’s healing at an unprecedented rate, even for Eren, but I can’t even imagine what this sort of injury would have done to an ordinary human. It was lucky he was standing so close to you. I guess that if we needed another excuse to keep him from the MP’s, we could always point to this and say he can be some sort of bodyguard for Her Queenship the Lady Historia. Or Erwin. Or even you, you have your fair share of enemies in certain places, right?” They knock a friendly shoulder into Levi’s.

After another moment of quiet, they chuckle softly, tweezers gleaming red as they pull more and more metal from Eren’s back. They nod towards the back of the room and say quietly, but not without humor, “They sure are devoted, huh? I made sure your Sasha got the other two some food and into bed. The three of them wanted to take turns sitting up with you and Eren, but I wouldn’t let them.” Levi looks up to see Armin and Mikasa on a cot pressed up against the wall, asleep, slumped against each other. It was easy to imagine Eren squished up in between them like a pile of puppies. "Those two refused to be moved," Hanji finishes quietly. 

An ancient grief tugs at Levi’s heart. He sees in his mind’s eye, for a just a moment, sunlight filtering through tree branches that dapples red hair into coppery bronze, silver-fair hair into pale gold; two pairs of eyes, forest green and ice-blue, warmed in the light of the sun. Hears the ghost of an echo of high, careless laughter.

He listens silently to Hanji as they talk, not offering any thoughts of his own. He guesses Hanji wouldn’t require comment, anyway. Sometimes they just talked to fill the silence that would otherwise press down on the two of them. He lets out a heavy breath, not quite a sigh. Poor kid. He presses the chloroform over Eren’s face again, and keeps a quiet vigil over all of them as Hanji works long into the night, eventually falling silent to concentrate through their exhaustion. As the hours drag on, the feeling of being indebted to this boy grows ever stronger in Levi's chest. 

**Author's Note:**

> let me know if y'all want more, i guess? i should be uploading more works soon-ish. the past couple of months were shitty and i had no time or motivation for writing anything of consequence. feel free to send me questions, prompts, whatever you like at isabelsmagnoliias.tumblr.com 
> 
> feedback me, darlings


End file.
